‘Between The Temples’ has Cassavetes written all over it

Content warning: Mentions of suicide.

When John Cassavetes (“A Woman Under the Influence”) broke into the film scene in the ’70s, he did not give a shit. Before him (and the New Hollywood movement), meticulous filmmakers like Orson Welles, Stanley Kubrick and Alfred Hitchcock dominated film discourse. Every one of those legends sought to extract the very most from the medium: In every movement, cut and shot was a world of meaning. Cassavetes and his New Hollywood colleagues changed all that. When Cassavetes directed films, he paid no attention to whether the shot was in focus or whether the lighting fit the scene. He wasn’t unintentional, but a technical mastermind and a perfectionist, Cassavetes was not. What mattered the most was evoking feeling — something that is perhaps lost through scrutinous perfection. So long as the audience felt in the company of his characters, Cassavetes considered his job well done.

Over the past 50 years, Cassavetes’ disregard for conventional film form has inspired a great number of directors, notably Martin Scorsese (“Taxi Driver”) and the Safdie brothers (“Uncut Gems”). Yet very few have dared to actually evoke Cassavetes, at least not in the same way that director Nathan Silver (“Thirst Street”) has done in his most recent feature “Between the Temples.”

The film follows Benjamin Gottlieb (Jason Schwartzman, “Rushmore”), a Jewish man, as he tries to make do with his depressingly sterile life. He’s a cantor at his local synagogue, but he can’t sing. He lost his wife a year ago, but he still listens to her erotic voicemails — without any sexual release. Throughout the film, Ben falls in love with his grade school music teacher, Clara (Carol Kane, “Hester Street”) — who is at least 30 years his senior. He is a pathetic loser, and Silver doesn’t shy away from it. In fact, Silver makes us confront this wonderless, aimless man, using the camera as his ultimate instrument. 

Like Cassavetes, Silver and cinematographer Sean Price Williams (“Good Time”) get uncomfortably close to their characters. Ninety percent of “Between the Temples” could have been filmed on a soundstage and we would’ve never known. The background is almost ancillary to the characters’ faces. No microexpression, twitch of the eye or sideways glance goes unnoticed in the film. We get to see — in film-grainy goodness — the slightly pudgy and downtrodden face of Schwartzman as he grimaces through the grueling chore that is his life.

Adding to the claustrophobia is John Magary’s (“Love After Love”) frenetic editing. Every cut is a bolded exclamation point, and Magary doesn’t necessarily lead from one scene to the next as much as he simply rushes from one face to another — harshly and haphazardly. Imagine a TMZ crew harassing some big pop star with a four-camera set-up, cutting constantly between each of the cameras at every change of facial expression. That’s the kind of kaleidoscopic perspective and frantic energy that “Between the Temples” brings. It’s a mess.

A mess that is remarkably raw, tender and endearing. In a time where entertainment has been rendered pristine and clean, Silver has brought feeling back. “Between the Temples” moves to the rhythm of Ben’s heart, and for most of its runtime, that heart is restlessly pounding. Ben might be pathetic, but he also needs a hug. Life hasn’t done him a solid, and at seemingly every turn he is terrorized by problems. Nothing goes his way, not even an attempted suicide (which is played for laughs). The camera work and editing are liberated from structure yet always busy, mirroring Ben’s directionless existence. “Between the Temples” crazed style allows us to empathize with Ben’s pain — serving the same function as Cassavetes’ confrontational style. The frequent use of close-ups also isolates his crisis as well as the actors who have put him in that position. Ben’s world, while chaotic and busy, is terribly lonely. It’s hard not to feel for the guy.

When Clara enters Ben’s life, things begin to clarify, both formally and emotionally. Silver and Williams employ more medium and wide shots when the two are together — a nice breather from the cacophony of close-ups. It is no mistake that the camera only rests when Ben is with Clara. The film is still chaotic and messy as hell, but life makes a tad more sense with her around. Silver doesn’t lean into sentimentality because the situation, regardless of affection, is ridiculous. Who would fall in love with their grade school teacher? Rather, Silver is compassionate but not forgiving, humorous but not vitriolic and, most importantly, deliberate but not too clever. He portrays the wacky romance as it is: a deeply embarrassing and chaotic situation that has — if you can overlook some major things — a rational, somewhat endearing cause. In the words of Selena Gomez, “The heart wants what it wants.” 

The most remarkable thing about “Between the Temples” is that Silver, while engaging with a very niche Cassavetes-inspired filmmaking style, makes it work within this humorous, absurd and romantic frame. The reason why very few have dared to evoke Cassavetes is because — for as much as the New Hollywood legend was influential — his style did not lend itself to versatility. It worked in moments and specific scenes, but over the length of a feature, it was too intense and harsh to fully adapt. In “Between the Temples,” Silver has softened that style, subtly slowing down the chaos at the right moments and infusing a peculiar levity. At the same time, he even incorporates aspects of avant-garde home video filmmaking and psychedelia, fulfilling the spontaneous, rogue ethos of New Hollywood.

Beyond the rousing performances, the unique story and the fascinating exploration of the Jewish-American experience — all of which deserve lengthy praise of their own — “Between the Temples” has brought back a sorely missed but beautifully messy and brave formal language.

So, is “Between the Temples” some kind of perfectionist masterpiece, one in which each frame can be carefully dissected and analyzed? No. But everything in “Between the Temples” is maximally designed to evoke feeling and speak to the heart. Isn’t that what art is all about?

Daily Arts Writer Ben Luu can be reached at benllv@umich.edu.

Related articles